Books that went to press or back to press this week:
CATHERINE'S RING, by Elena Dorothy Bowman
SECOND REPUBLIC, by Steven Clark Bradley
NIGHT UNDONE, by K.S. Brooks
Galleys sent out or sent out again this week:
GOOD FRIDAYS, by Diane Marquette
MY DEAREST FRIEND, by Hazel Stratham
YOUR PLACE OR MINE, by Lynette Hall Hampton
Work continued on:
ROUGH WATERS, by Gianni Hayes
FACEPAINTER MURDERS by Virginia Winters
Waiting on Galleys to be returned:
A GRANDFATHER'S GIFT, by Hugh Carter Vinson
Friday, July 29, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Dialogue on point -- writing tip
Question: My writer's group says my dialogue is not on point. They tell me I need to "stop being repetitive" and to "get on with things." But isn't dialogue supposed to be written the way people really talk?
Answer: Yes and no. Dialogue should be written the way people really talk, but leaving out the boring parts. Most of what people say IS boring. Stick with what is important and tell (YES TELL) the rest in narrative.
For instance, take this story situation:
In Scene one, Sally’s brother John was in a 40-car pile up on the Interstate. He lies for hours, pinned in the car, then finally is picked up by helicopter and taken to Shock-Trauma. There he is rushed into surgery while (end of scene hook) a nurse tosses his wallet to the ward clerk, yelling, “Call his next-of-kin.”
In scene two: Sally, having learned the news, hangs up the phone, rushes out of the house and meets her neighbor, Paul, a friend of John’s. Here’s scene two:
Sally hung up the phone, grabbed her jacket and headed for the door, frantic to get to the hospital and find out how badly John was hurt. (Opening Hook, and there's no need to play out the hospital person giving her the news--the reader already knows that.) It wasn’t until she actually got into the garage that she remembered John had been driving her car the night before, because his was in the repair shop. (Character-building, shows confusion caused by the emergency situation.) Without a second thought for her damaged car (Character-revealing, shows her first concern is her brother’s life), Sally hurried out to the street and all but ran toward the bus stop.
Half a block down the street, Paul Anderson, a friend of John’s, put down his rake and caught up with Sally. “Where are you going in such a hurry? What’s wrong?” (Now in reality he would probably have said, “Hey, Sally. Wait a minute. I want to talk to you.” But that would not have moved the story forward. Dialogue should always move the story forward and it should be about something important). No small talk.
“It’s, John! He’s in the hospital.” Sally told Paul about the accident. (Narrative used. No need to repeat all the action about the 40-car pile-up, what the person on the phone told her, and John’s being pinned in the car for hours — the reader already knows that.) You have to tell the reader everything, but you only have to tell them once.
“No wonder you are upset. Come on, I’ll drive you.” Paul took off his gardening gloves and ran for his pickup. By the time he got the door open, Sally was already waiting inside.
“Hurry!.” Sally gave Paul a worried look. “I have to find out how he is.”
Answer: Yes and no. Dialogue should be written the way people really talk, but leaving out the boring parts. Most of what people say IS boring. Stick with what is important and tell (YES TELL) the rest in narrative.
For instance, take this story situation:
In Scene one, Sally’s brother John was in a 40-car pile up on the Interstate. He lies for hours, pinned in the car, then finally is picked up by helicopter and taken to Shock-Trauma. There he is rushed into surgery while (end of scene hook) a nurse tosses his wallet to the ward clerk, yelling, “Call his next-of-kin.”
In scene two: Sally, having learned the news, hangs up the phone, rushes out of the house and meets her neighbor, Paul, a friend of John’s. Here’s scene two:
Sally hung up the phone, grabbed her jacket and headed for the door, frantic to get to the hospital and find out how badly John was hurt. (Opening Hook, and there's no need to play out the hospital person giving her the news--the reader already knows that.) It wasn’t until she actually got into the garage that she remembered John had been driving her car the night before, because his was in the repair shop. (Character-building, shows confusion caused by the emergency situation.) Without a second thought for her damaged car (Character-revealing, shows her first concern is her brother’s life), Sally hurried out to the street and all but ran toward the bus stop.
Half a block down the street, Paul Anderson, a friend of John’s, put down his rake and caught up with Sally. “Where are you going in such a hurry? What’s wrong?” (Now in reality he would probably have said, “Hey, Sally. Wait a minute. I want to talk to you.” But that would not have moved the story forward. Dialogue should always move the story forward and it should be about something important). No small talk.
“It’s, John! He’s in the hospital.” Sally told Paul about the accident. (Narrative used. No need to repeat all the action about the 40-car pile-up, what the person on the phone told her, and John’s being pinned in the car for hours — the reader already knows that.) You have to tell the reader everything, but you only have to tell them once.
“No wonder you are upset. Come on, I’ll drive you.” Paul took off his gardening gloves and ran for his pickup. By the time he got the door open, Sally was already waiting inside.
“Hurry!.” Sally gave Paul a worried look. “I have to find out how he is.”
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Squash Cake -- recipe
| SQUASH CAKE | |
| 1 pkg. yellow cake mix 2 c. cooked yellow squash, cooled (drain well & mash about thickness of pumpkin) 2 eggs 1 1/2 tsp,. baking soda 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon Combine all ingredients, beating until smooth. Spoon batter into greased (not floured) angel food pan. Bake 45-50 minutes in 350 degree oven. Cake very moist. Good unfrosted. May substitute pumpkin for squash. | |
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Let the Buyer Beware on e-bay - writing tip
Author Rowena Cherry reported to EPIC this week more piracy going on at eBay.
Regarding: EBay auction item
11,000 Romance Novels eBook Pdf on 2 DVDs Free Shipping
Item Id: 230633024011 (and other auctions)
Seller bhsucreoriginal (574) aka Mr Eng B El-Sokkary, 10295 Lynches River Road, Lynchburg, SC 29080
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem <http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230641699430#ht_2298wt_1399 >&item=230641699430#ht_2298wt_1399
The seller alleges that he has reseller rights.
He is also selling other collections of 17,000 e-books, and various other genres of fiction.
He insists that he has the rights to these DVDs. He also includes "copyright text" asserting his own copyright over the DVDs.
Rowena did complain to him and said she sent him a "cease and desist" letter, as her titles did appear on his disk.
In selling these items he is violating the rights of many authors and their publishers. I did read the list and didn't find any of my authors in the first few letters -- however there were thousands of names.
Rowena mentioned that she has complained about this guy under several different names now, and had him kicked off eBay, only to find him turning up, with the same products, again and again, under new seller IDs. Quite a simple thing to do, just register as a new member of eBay, with a different name. They do no background checks and ANYone can join the site. I could easily register my cat as an eBay user.
It would be nice, as Rowena suggests, if EPIC and other author's associations were to get involved in trying to stop this kind of abuse of our legal rights as authors. The Author's Guild, the only organization with enough clout to do it, takes little note of e-book authors, requiring an advance from the publisher of "at least $1000" for an author to have membership, let alone representation. With this requirement, they exclude not only almost all ebook publisher and authors, but those with small press publishers as well.
I'd like to say there's something we can do. But in reality--though I have played my part as a publisher in sending "cease and desist" letters and making (sometimes successful) threats of legal action to protect our authors in the past, in reality there is little we can do to stop these thieves. You can get a server to deny them privileges by complaining that they are breaking the law, yes, but there are thousands more servers, many outside the United States who are not subject to our copyright laws, and there is no coordinated list where ISPs can check whether a business registering a domain with them is legitimate or not.
There is no Better Business Bureau on the web. And, like the poor, the dishonest will always be with us.
So what can we do about them? Not much. We can only pray that honest customers will come to realize --as they have already realized with all those letters from bankers' wives in Nigeria, promising them millions if only they will send a thousand dollars--that if a deal on the web sounds too good to be true, it is probably operated by someone dishonest.
I have long deplored the "buy books from your branded device only" philosophy followed by the makers of reading devices, all of whom have developed their own formatting language and operate "stores" and who make it almost impossible for you to buy formatted books from anyone else and read them on their brand of reader.
However, I can't help a smirk or two when I think about the person who pays this pirate for "11,000 Romance novels" and then finds he can't read a one of them on his Kindle, Nook, or eBookWise reader, but must sit hours staring at the computer screen to read them....
In the phrase of the old Civil Law Court -- "Let the Buyer Beware...." :)
Regarding: EBay auction item
11,000 Romance Novels eBook Pdf on 2 DVDs Free Shipping
Item Id: 230633024011 (and other auctions)
Seller bhsucreoriginal (574) aka Mr Eng B El-Sokkary, 10295 Lynches River Road, Lynchburg, SC 29080
http://cgi.ebay.
The seller alleges that he has reseller rights.
He is also selling other collections of 17,000 e-books, and various other genres of fiction.
He insists that he has the rights to these DVDs. He also includes "copyright text" asserting his own copyright over the DVDs.
Rowena did complain to him and said she sent him a "cease and desist" letter, as her titles did appear on his disk.
In selling these items he is violating the rights of many authors and their publishers. I did read the list and didn't find any of my authors in the first few letters -- however there were thousands of names.
Rowena mentioned that she has complained about this guy under several different names now, and had him kicked off eBay, only to find him turning up, with the same products, again and again, under new seller IDs. Quite a simple thing to do, just register as a new member of eBay, with a different name. They do no background checks and ANYone can join the site. I could easily register my cat as an eBay user.
It would be nice, as Rowena suggests, if EPIC and other author's associations were to get involved in trying to stop this kind of abuse of our legal rights as authors. The Author's Guild, the only organization with enough clout to do it, takes little note of e-book authors, requiring an advance from the publisher of "at least $1000" for an author to have membership, let alone representation. With this requirement, they exclude not only almost all ebook publisher and authors, but those with small press publishers as well.
I'd like to say there's something we can do. But in reality--though I have played my part as a publisher in sending "cease and desist" letters and making (sometimes successful) threats of legal action to protect our authors in the past, in reality there is little we can do to stop these thieves. You can get a server to deny them privileges by complaining that they are breaking the law, yes, but there are thousands more servers, many outside the United States who are not subject to our copyright laws, and there is no coordinated list where ISPs can check whether a business registering a domain with them is legitimate or not.
There is no Better Business Bureau on the web. And, like the poor, the dishonest will always be with us.
So what can we do about them? Not much. We can only pray that honest customers will come to realize --as they have already realized with all those letters from bankers' wives in Nigeria, promising them millions if only they will send a thousand dollars--that if a deal on the web sounds too good to be true, it is probably operated by someone dishonest.
I have long deplored the "buy books from your branded device only" philosophy followed by the makers of reading devices, all of whom have developed their own formatting language and operate "stores" and who make it almost impossible for you to buy formatted books from anyone else and read them on their brand of reader.
However, I can't help a smirk or two when I think about the person who pays this pirate for "11,000 Romance novels" and then finds he can't read a one of them on his Kindle, Nook, or eBookWise reader, but must sit hours staring at the computer screen to read them....
In the phrase of the old Civil Law Court -- "Let the Buyer Beware...." :)
Monday, July 25, 2011
Salad Dressing - recipe
With all the gardens coming off, we thought this might be of interest...
David Smith’s Caesar salad dressing
1/4 cup wine vinegar
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons fresh grated Romano cheese
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 ½ inches Anchovy paste - which about covers the bowl of a regular ice tea spoon
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon black pepper (fine, fresh ground black pepper is best)
In an empty jar with a top, put the 1/4 cup wine vinegar, stir in the Anchovy paste (try an ice tea spoon), add the dry ingredients, stir well, then add oil the 1/2 cup of oil. Cover and shake well just before use.
Serve over salad greens and croutons.
Contributed by David Smith, author of Falling Below the Line... a non-fiction book that examines what you can do to survive in hard times....
David Smith’s Caesar salad dressing
1/4 cup wine vinegar
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons fresh grated Romano cheese
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 ½ inches Anchovy paste - which about covers the bowl of a regular ice tea spoon
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon black pepper (fine, fresh ground black pepper is best)
In an empty jar with a top, put the 1/4 cup wine vinegar, stir in the Anchovy paste (try an ice tea spoon), add the dry ingredients, stir well, then add oil the 1/2 cup of oil. Cover and shake well just before use.
Serve over salad greens and croutons.
Contributed by David Smith, author of Falling Below the Line... a non-fiction book that examines what you can do to survive in hard times....
Friday, July 22, 2011
Catching UP
Books that went to press, or went to press again, this week:
RANDOM APPLES, by Terry L. White
TRAVELER, by David Yates
EASTERN SHORE LIFE AND LURE, by the Writers Bloc
RED EMERALDS, by Spencer Dane
Galleys went out on:
FACEPAINTER MURDERS, by Virginia Winters
YOUR PLACE OR MINE, by Lynette Hampton
GOOD FRIDAYS, by Diane Marquette
Galleys still out on:
A GRANDFATHER'S GIFT, by Hugh Vinson
PLAYING WITH FIRE, by Tonya Ramagos
Work continued on:
ROUGH WATERS, by Gianni Hayes
CATHERINE'S RING, by Elena Bowman
Best Sellers at Fictionwise in the last 20 Days
Based on data gathered within the last 20 days. Icon explanations
1.![Long [82178 words]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sAJINi5xQnGyE0H5oj0-lNIOrz07vkB12eFj68qpXVKfxTfQqhwgDeZ4AsYAd0ot2SUPFlZ1xY4Bkwzxf2k3ESWYtZP5crpOQgMWw1sg=s0-d "Long [82178 words]")
Memoirs of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs [People]
2.Ghost Meets an Angel [Shannon Delaney Paranormal Mystery Series, Vol. 3] by Elizabeth Eagan-Cox [Mystery/Crime]
3.Return of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle [Mystery/Crime/Classic Literature]
4.![Short [21781 words]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_t3FZwZFmDcROfeg-tRTmnn93PhXRDGlLhOUqMON8AhVWEOEPXJ3DESUAk6eOmlG4peQg6kPS6lo2mUrW7C-70YyqsTTCxbwTMa_PxqOJo=s0-d "Short [21781 words]")
Timequake by Patricia Uletilovic [Children's Fiction]
5.![Mid-Length [44390 words]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vVtkr8BUqRCewAJPFJ2Rd8BL1S6jYsBxAd56n36w-HG6i3Q-2U8aJeZhPDpZ1hamIQQZUmiUlwwr9bmGMwlSkwlnAjjjC-qeVv-qAhd79k=s0-d "Mid-Length [44390 words]")
A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle [Mystery/Crime]
6.A Ghost of a Chance [Shannon Delaney Series Book 1] by Elizabeth Eagan-Cox [Mystery/Crime/Romance]
7.Spirit of Wind [Spirit Series Book 3] by Arline Chase [Historical Fiction/Mystery/Crime]
8.A Ghost from the Shadows [Book 2: Shannon Delaney Paranormal Mystery Series] by Elizabeth Eagan-Cox [Mystery/Crime/Mainstream]
9.High Places by Nina M. Osier [Science Fiction]
10.Sign of Four by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle [Mystery/Crime/Historical Fiction]
Highest Reader Rated books at Fictionwise
RANDOM APPLES, by Terry L. White
TRAVELER, by David Yates
EASTERN SHORE LIFE AND LURE, by the Writers Bloc
RED EMERALDS, by Spencer Dane
Galleys went out on:
FACEPAINTER MURDERS, by Virginia Winters
YOUR PLACE OR MINE, by Lynette Hampton
GOOD FRIDAYS, by Diane Marquette
Galleys still out on:
A GRANDFATHER'S GIFT, by Hugh Vinson
PLAYING WITH FIRE, by Tonya Ramagos
Work continued on:
ROUGH WATERS, by Gianni Hayes
CATHERINE'S RING, by Elena Bowman
Best Sellers at Fictionwise in the last 20 Days
Based on data gathered within the last 20 days. Icon explanations
1.
Memoirs of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs [People]2.
Ghost Meets an Angel [Shannon Delaney Paranormal Mystery Series, Vol. 3] by Elizabeth Eagan-Cox [Mystery/Crime]3.
Return of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle [Mystery/Crime/Classic Literature]4.
Timequake by Patricia Uletilovic [Children's Fiction]5.
A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle [Mystery/Crime]6.
A Ghost of a Chance [Shannon Delaney Series Book 1] by Elizabeth Eagan-Cox [Mystery/Crime/Romance]7.
Spirit of Wind [Spirit Series Book 3] by Arline Chase [Historical Fiction/Mystery/Crime]8.
A Ghost from the Shadows [Book 2: Shannon Delaney Paranormal Mystery Series] by Elizabeth Eagan-Cox [Mystery/Crime/Mainstream]9.
High Places by Nina M. Osier [Science Fiction]10.
Sign of Four by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle [Mystery/Crime/Historical Fiction]Highest Reader Rated books at Fictionwise
| Rated for ebooksonthe.net |
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